I’m The Male Lead’s Biological Daughter, But I Want To Live With The Second Male Lead! - Chapter 111

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Novels. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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Episode 111
“Yes, well, before that—you know how it was? When Father said something to the child… and all that.”
“……!”
Mabel’s body went rigid in an instant.
“What is it?”
Winter, who had been pretending not to listen to Dain’s every word, perked up her round ears and looked up at him.
“Done!”
Seizing the moment, Shilla quickly wrapped the Cape around Winter’s neck.
She didn’t forget to fasten the Ribbon with a pin so it wouldn’t come loose.
But the Cape was the last thing on Winter’s mind right now.
Mabel’s lips, which had parted slightly, trembled as she barely managed to squeeze out a whisper.
“That was… a slip of the tongue… wasn’t it……?”
“Yes? Oh, yes.”
Dain suddenly felt that something had gone wrong.
But not knowing exactly what, he pressed on.
Otherwise, Zigmund looked ready to break down and weep right here in the middle of the Corridor.
As his aide, he wanted to prevent at least that spectacle.
“The Grand Duke is reflecting deeply on this matter and carries great regret. So…….”
Dain’s words continued for some time after that.
But none of them reached Mabel’s ears.
‘A slip of the tongue… is that what it was…….’
So that was it.
It had just been a mistake.
Just… a mistake…….
“Hey, look here!”
Winter thrashed about, desperate to distract Mabel from her thoughts.
She had to stop whatever Mabel was thinking.
But Mabel’s eyes had already lost focus.
Her gaze dropped, and a lonely smile flickered across her lips.
‘Of course.’
Only now did the puzzle pieces in Mabel’s mind seem to fall into place.
Days ago, when Mabel had tried to flee the Office, Zigmund had held her back urgently, as though he had something to say.
But he had let her go without speaking.
And ever since that day, he had grown haggard and begun to fumble uncertainly whenever he stood before her.
As though he had something he needed to say.
‘Then this Dress too, was really…….’
Mabel’s eyes dropped to the Dress and Shoes she was wearing.
Zigmund had said something clearly at that moment.
– This, it’s… well, it’s just! Just a gift.
Mabel had taken that to mean “like a father giving to his child.”
Since it was just a gift, don’t inquire about the price later trying to repay him, something along those lines.
But it seemed that wasn’t what he meant.
It appeared he had given her the Dress to smooth over that slip of the tongue he’d made—not some paternal gesture toward a child, but just to gloss over his own mistake.
That’s why he’d said “just.”
Not like a father giving to his child, but just… a gift.
“I see… that’s how it was…….”
By then, Aselt and Kellic had noticed the shift in Mabel’s atmosphere.
“Mabel?”
“Mabel……!”
It was as Aselt and Kellic pushed past Dain and rushed forward.
Plink.
A teardrop fell onto the round toe of the Shoes Zigmund had given her.
Silence spread sharply through the crowd that had been chattering at the doorway.
Tap, plink…….
Heavy drops of tears continued to fall onto the toe of the Shoes Mabel wore.
Just then, Zigmund—whose mind had drifted to some distant place—snapped back to awareness.
“……Mabel?”
Zigmund lurched to his feet and pushed through the crowd toward her.
In the Corridor filled only with silence, the rustle of his garments sounded unusually loud.
“Mabel, Mabel. What’s wrong? What is it.”
Zigmund knelt on one knee directly before Mabel and examined the child.
There were no visible signs of injury.
The warmth she felt from his hand holding her shoulder was normal.
Yet Mabel’s face looked more pained than it ever had before.
“It’s nothing, nothing at all, nothing…….”
“Nothing? You wouldn’t be crying like this over nothing, would you?”
Mabel wasn’t someone who cried easily, nor was she one to cry often.
She wasn’t the sort of child who wept at random, without cause.
His heart sank like a stone.
“What’s wrong? Hmm? Why are you crying? Who made you cry, hmm?”
Zigmund wiped away the tears streaming down Mabel’s cheeks with anxious hands.
Mabel, who had been biting her lower lip and sniffling, looked up at him.
Her large, round eyes brimmed with tears as her lips trembled.
“……Was it?”
“Hmm?”
“A slip of the tongue……?”
“A slip of the tongue……?”
Each time Mabel blinked, fat tears rolled down her cheeks.
Though he didn’t fully understand what she meant, Zigmund held the child close and dried her tears.
“Who made a slip of the tongue? Who did something wrong to you, hmm?”
At his gentle tone, fresh tears welled up in Mabel’s eyes.
She bit her lower lip again, whimpering, and forced out her words.
“Dain… Dain said…….”
All eyes turned sharply toward Dain in an instant.
‘Me? Me?’
Dain’s face flushed with confusion as he pointed at himself, blinking rapidly.
Before Aselt and Kellic’s expressions had even turned cold as they regarded Dain, Ella quietly approached him.
She clamped her hand over Dain’s mouth before he could speak.
As Dain made muffled sounds, Zigmund gently encouraged the child to continue her story.
“Yes, Dain said?”
“Just now, just now…….”
“Yes, just now?”
“He told me that… hic… that you made… hic… a slip of the tongue…….”
Now hiccupping, Mabel’s shoulders trembled.
Zigmund patted the child’s back gently.
“Dain said I made a slip of the tongue? What slip of the tongue was it?”
What slip of the tongue?
That was…….
The thought that everything she’d been happy about was all a foolish misunderstanding made her nose sting again.
“Before, before Dad… when… when you said something to me before, Dad… I… Dad…….”
So Mabel stopped mid-sentence, threw her head back, and burst into tears.
She cried so miserably that anyone listening felt their heart ache.
“Oh dear…….”
Zigmund’s face was shadowed with dismay.
At this rate, Mabel might work herself into a fever and collapse.
“Shh, calm down. Calm down, Mabel. Hmm?”
Zigmund rose and left the room to try to settle Mabel.
Even as Mabel was carried away in Zigmund’s arms, she kept talking.
“Dad, I… I thought… maybe I’d have a dad… a slip of the tongue… I was happy… I was so glad…….”
She had been happy at the thought that she might have a father, truly so happy.
The raw sincerity that poured from Mabel along with her tears echoed long through the Corridor.
“So when I thought… hic… that it was just a slip of the… hic… tongue…….”
“I see. That’s why you’re crying.”
Zigmund continued patting Mabel’s back, soothing the hiccupping child.
As he walked on, soothing the child, they found themselves in the Garden before he knew it.
As he looked for a place to sit while comforting the child, Zigmund’s gaze fell upon a bench.
He made his way to the bench near the pond and sat down.
A cool breeze brushed across Mabel’s sweat-dampened forehead and passed on.
Thanks to the refreshing wind, she seemed to calm down a little.
“Sniff… sniffle…….”
Mabel poured out her words in a flood of tears, her shoulders heaving with sobs.
Yet still she clung to Zigmund’s neck, leaning against him without letting go.
She couldn’t bring herself to face him, couldn’t convince herself that everything was fine now.
Belated embarrassment was creeping in, bit by bit.
‘How shameful……’
She knew full well this wasn’t something worth crying over like this.
‘How bewildered he must be.’
She’d thrown a festival all by herself, never once considering whether he wanted any of it.
When Mabel, though seeming to have composed herself, still wouldn’t lift her head, Zigmund—who had been patting her back all along—finally spoke.
“If you ask me to, I’d do it right now.”
“……?”
What did he mean by that?
Mabel stirred slightly, lifting her head a fraction.
Zigmund answered her small, questioning movement.
“About your father.”
“……!”
Mabel’s shoulders went rigid.
“Dain seems to have misunderstood something, but that wasn’t a slip of the tongue. It was my true heart, held back for far too long.”
His calm voice descended upon the crown of her head.
Mabel remained still, her cheek resting against his shoulder.
What was he saying?
It wasn’t a mistake? His true heart, held back all this time?
Did he truly think the same as she did?
She couldn’t quite believe it.
To Mabel, Zigmund spoke then with an ease born of self-reflection.
“To be honest, Mabel, I find myself amusing too.”
A hint of laughter colored his voice.
Mabel glanced up at him.
“I don’t know how you’ll take what I’m about to say……”
Sensing her gaze, Zigmund looked down at her.
Their eyes met, and Mabel jumped, her head snapping down in a rush.
Zigmund let out a brief laugh, continuing as he patted her back.
“At first, I mean when I brought you here. Back then, I never thought it would come to this.”
Zigmund knew it well.
No matter how one dressed it up, his reason for bringing Mabel back then had been impulse and guilt.
The child who had lived like a phantom with her existence erased—he couldn’t bear her suffering.
Those crimson eyes that so desperately wanted to live; he simply couldn’t pretend not to see them.
Such words were nothing but pretty excuses.
Zigmund had brought Mabel with him out of sorrow for her plight, caught up as she was in the affairs of adults.

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Novels. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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